Thoughts on Collaboration inspired by Yuval Noah Harari

I recently came across an article written by Yuval Noah Harari from March 20, 2020 about the world after coronavirus.

In fact, I already read it a year ago, but this time I was impressed by the following thought.

"The second important choice we confront is between nationalist isolation and global solidarity. Both the epidemic itself and the resulting economic crisis are global problems. They can be solved effectively only by global co-operation."

And further the author develops his idea about the advantages of global collaboration and the consequences if countries isolate themselves and do not share information with each other and do not help each other.

I think he is absolutely right. But I would like to step aside now and think about how cooperation is important in our everyday work life.

I am an individualist by nature. It was always easier for me to do everything myself than to ask someone for help and I wasn't comfortable with sharing my ideas with others. Moreover, in my opinion, any task would probably not be done as it should be, at the very least, not so quickly and not so well, etc. Therefore, I used to think that collaboration was just a corporate cliché, a buzzword, and nothing more.

Usually the companies I worked for encouraged competition, and not collaboration. Individual successes were valued more. In essence, the goals set were in total disregard of cooperation. To survive and succeed, one had to give up on collaboration and show great individual results instead.

However, competition can hold us back from achieving our greatest potential because it is divisive as there can only be one winner. Collaboration, on the contrary, is all about progressing as a whole. There is no winner unless the entire team crosses the finish line together.

Yuval Noah Harari is right. The modern world will cope with global problems only if all countries cooperate globally. If we transfer this to the corporate world, then the most successful companies will be those that have collaborative teams.

A collaborative team has more impact than a person working alone.

Everybody is unique and has their own strengths and weaknesses. Most people are great at one or two things, good at several things, and average and bad at everything else. A collaborative team lets each person focus on what they’re great at, while trusting that every other task will be handled by somebody who’s great at that thing.

As a result, such a team is better at solving problems and is more creative. In addition, collaboration brings people closer together. People learn more from each other and trust each other. At long last, a collaborative team becomes more open, connected, and engaged. It leads to higher retention rates.

This collaborative principle is beneficial for an individual too.

An individual can grow and develop alone only up to a certain point. To reach your full potential, you must let people into your life and interact more with them. It takes a lot of courage and wisdom to really listen to others, let go and trust others to help you. It will be worth it and will make your life richer in all senses.